Master Abnormal Security with our step-by-step tutorial, detailed feature walkthrough, and expert tips.
Request a personalized demo at abnormal.ai/demo and discuss your email security requirements with the Abnormal team to receive a tailored risk assessment showing threats bypassing your current defenses Authorize the Abnormal Security API application within your Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace admin console — the connection takes less than five minutes with no MX record changes or mail routing modifications Allow two to four weeks for behavioral baseline establishment as the AI learns your organization's normal communication patterns, vendor relationships, user behaviors, and authentication norms Review the Abnormal Security dashboard to monitor detected threats, examine forensic details for each incident, tune detection sensitivity, and configure automated remediation actions and notification preferences Integrate Abnormal with your SIEM platform (Splunk, Microsoft Sentinel, CrowdStrike Falcon) and security orchestration tools to incorporate email threat data into your unified security operations workflows
💡 Quick Start: Follow these 1 steps in order to get up and running with Abnormal Security quickly.
Explore the key features that make Abnormal Security powerful for content & seo workflows.
Builds comprehensive behavioral profiles for every user, vendor, and communication relationship in the organization by analyzing thousands of signals per message — including writing style, tone, communication frequency, authentication patterns, and supply chain interactions. Detects anomalies that deviate from established baselines, catching novel threats that have no known signatures.
Specialized detection models for BEC attacks use identity intelligence, communication context analysis, urgency signal detection, and financial request pattern recognition to identify impersonation attempts, fraudulent payment requests, and social engineering that contains no malicious payloads. Reports detection rates up to 65% higher than traditional gateways.
Monitors internal account behavior including sign-in events, impossible travel detection, mail rule modifications, lateral email sending patterns, and authentication anomalies to detect compromised accounts. Automatically remediates by terminating suspicious sessions, blocking unauthorized access, and alerting security teams.
Connects directly to Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace via native API integration, requiring no MX record changes, no gateway configuration, and no agent installation. Deployment completes in minutes with full behavioral analysis beginning immediately, and the platform operates as an overlay that does not add latency to mail delivery.
Builds behavioral profiles of vendor communication patterns through VendorBase, tracking invoice formatting, payment instruction norms, communication frequency, and email authentication for every vendor relationship. Detects compromised vendor accounts and fraudulent modifications to legitimate business communications.
Automatically remediates detected threats by removing malicious messages from user inboxes, terminating compromised sessions, and triggering notification workflows — all without requiring manual SOC intervention. The AI Security Mailbox further automates triage of user-reported suspicious emails, classifying reports and providing contextual responses.
No, Abnormal Security is designed to supplement your existing email security stack rather than necessarily replace it. Most organizations deploy Abnormal alongside their current SEG (such as Proofpoint or Mimecast) or native Microsoft/Google protections to catch the sophisticated attacks those tools miss — particularly text-based BEC and social engineering. However, some organizations have replaced their SEG entirely, relying on Microsoft Defender or Google's native protections as the first layer with Abnormal as the behavioral AI layer. Abnormal offers a free risk assessment that shows threats bypassing your current defenses to help you determine the right deployment model.
Abnormal deploys in minutes through API integration with Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace — no MX record changes, no gateway configuration, and no agent installation required. The initial API connection takes less than five minutes. The platform begins analyzing email traffic immediately, with behavioral AI models reaching full effectiveness within approximately one to two weeks as they learn your organization's communication patterns, vendor relationships, and normal user behaviors.
Abnormal excels at detecting attacks with no traditional indicators of compromise, particularly business email compromise (BEC), executive impersonation, invoice and payment fraud, vendor email compromise, credential phishing, account takeover, lateral phishing from compromised internal accounts, payroll diversion, supply chain attacks, malware and ransomware delivery, and social engineering across email and messaging platforms. The behavioral AI approach is especially effective against novel, zero-day threats that have no known signatures.
Abnormal primarily serves mid-size to large enterprises, with most customers having 1,000 or more mailboxes. The enterprise-focused pricing model and sales-led evaluation process make it less accessible for small businesses with limited budgets. Organizations with fewer than 500 users may find better value in solutions like Microsoft Defender for Office 365 (included with E5 licenses), Check Point Avanan, or Sublime Security. Abnormal is best suited for organizations where the cost of a single successful BEC attack justifies the premium investment in behavioral AI protection.
Abnormal Security supports Microsoft 365 (Exchange Online) and Google Workspace as its primary integration platforms. The API-native architecture connects directly to these cloud email environments without any mail routing changes. On-premises Exchange, hybrid configurations with on-premises components, and other email platforms such as Lotus Notes or Zimbra are not currently supported. Organizations must be fully migrated to cloud email to deploy Abnormal.
Abnormal's behavioral AI approach significantly reduces false positives compared to rule-based systems because it evaluates messages against learned behavioral baselines rather than static signatures. Each detection includes a detailed explanation of why the message was flagged, showing the specific behavioral deviations identified. Security teams can review and provide feedback on detections through the dashboard, which continuously refines the AI models. Organizations typically report false positive rates well below 0.01% after the initial behavioral learning period is complete.
Now that you know how to use Abnormal Security, it's time to put this knowledge into practice.
Sign up and follow the tutorial steps
Check pros, cons, and user feedback
See how it stacks against alternatives
Follow our tutorial and master this powerful content & seo tool in minutes.
Tutorial updated March 2026